This course covers in the chronological order each defining step of an entrepreneurial project. It begins with very personal considerations related to getting to better know yourself better so as to decide if you are ready for the multiple challenges of entrepreneurship. It then deals with creativity in order to provide the right set of tools to find an idea with the right potential to disrupt an existing business. We then discuss how to gather a founding team, how to raise money to initiate the project, and how to deal with day to day cash management. Later in the course, we discuss the art of selling, focusing on business to business sales, and how to measure the product launch phase using cohort analysis. Later on, we discuss the challenges of HR in an entrepreneurial environment, and of recruiting at a point where nobody knows your company. We then describe very practical techniques to initiate the international development of a small company. Last, we cover the exit strategy topic.

Reviews

AF

Dear Ambroise Huret teacher, thank you for all these advices. If you continue teaching a class online, it would be a pleasure to participate to it.

LC

Jan 10, 2018

Filled StarFilled StarFilled StarFilled StarFilled Star

Excelent this course, the teacher is excelent and the participation of the guest is very good. In resume the course have information very valuable

From the lesson

Securing the first key steps of your entrepreneurial project

Welcome to the module 2- this week, you will learn about some creativity techniques designed for entrepreneurship. You will also learn a step by step strategy to gather a founding team. Finally, you will be able to learn about the analysis of your financial strategy, so as to decide if you should raise money…or not…and how.

Taught By

Ambroise Huret

Transcript

[MUSIC] Now that you took some time to think about it, let me give you some specific, concrete examples of how you can easily demonstrate to your future teammates that you're 100% convinced about your idea, and that you're actually going for it, with or without them. Only if they feel they might "miss the train of success", will they come to you and ask the desired question: "Are you looking for a potential partner for your new company?" The first thing you should be saying at this point is, yes, you have decided to "launch the company". By saying that, some potential entrepreneurs will most probably begin asking you from time to time about your progress. This is when you will need to be able to show tangible signs that you're indeed making progress. You could, for instance, begin by finding a name for your company, so you can begin referring to it by name instead of "the company" every time someone asks you about your project. You can then also print some business cards with a nice logo on them. To be even more practical here, there are as you know, thousands of internet sites on which you can have a freelancer design your logo for a very reasonable price, and as you also know, it does not cost a lot to print 100 business cards that you will distribute around you to anyone who could be interested by your project. Another detail here, I would not advise you to put yourself as CEO on those initial business cards. On the contrary, I would just put your name and the name of your future company, for two reasons: 1) By putting "CEO" on your business card, you will seem to already close the door to a potential 50/50 deal. 2) Should you begin to meet some prospects for your projects, there are many occasions on which you want to keep the freedom to present yourself as: "not the one who makes the final decision". This can be very useful when you need to negotiate something you buy for instance. The next easy step is, of course, to build a corporate website. I'm not talking here about the actual website of the service you want to launch. I am talking about a small, inexpensive website developed by a cheap freelancer that will detail your company's vision. Some of the sections of this alpha website could be for instance: "Our Vision" (remember, it is not about you anymore, it is about your company). In this section, you should give the broad directions of your project and try to be as aspirational as possible. It is your elevator pitch to convince top talents to join your project. "Our Values": this is where you need to be creative and fun, never ever write something like "honesty", "teamwork", etc. Those values have been used again and again for the last 100 years. What you need here are values that will distinguish your future company and once again be aspirational. "We are hiring!": Of course, at this point you're not actually ready to hire but you never know what could come in, there are good surprises and it demonstrates your ambition to quickly scale up the team. Remember, every time you complete one of those small steps, you should let the people around you know about it. Tell them "hey you know what, the website is ready, tell me what you think about it!" This process lets you slowly but surely demonstrate that you're actually building the company. Once you have your "corporate website", of course you will want to promote it and to leverage your online social networks as much as you can. You have to carry a message when you go live on those networks and at this stage, the easiest one is, "we are hiring". The next easy step is to rent a small space in an open space or a cheap sublocation. That way, you can, for instance, write a mail that says: "Please note our new office address". Those are easy steps that actually do not put you significantly at risk, all you risk in the end is to lose a very limited amount of money. [MUSIC]

Explore our Catalog

Join for free and get personalized recommendations, updates and offers.